Sol 2082: A New MAHLI Selfie

14 June 2018

The investigation of the Duluth drill hole
is going well, and is expected to continue on Sol 2082. First, MAHLI
will take a picture of the drill tailings to look for an imprint of the
APXS contact sensor, then will acquire another rover "selfie." The
major dust storm that caused the solar-powered
Opportunity rover, on the other side of Mars, to shut down
has somewhat darkened the skies over Gale Crater, but is not expected to
seriously
affect MSL operations. Still, there is great interest in the
environmental effects of the dust storm, so the Sol 2082 plan includes
more Navcam and Mastcam observations of atmospheric dust and Right
Mastcam images intended to detect changes due to winds.
ChemCam will also measure the elemental chemistry of the material in
the sample dump pile, if the wind hasn't blown the pile away by then!
Finally, MAHLI will take images of the calibration targets on the front
of the rover to monitor camera performance.